Recycling Solutions, the latest investee of Sigma’s Innovation Fund, is a waste management business based in Whitecross near Linlithgow which is gaining market share by offering clients the opportunity to meet demanding recycling targets. Sigma’s £300k equity investment is to be supplemented by an application for a £200k SFLGS loan.
The company’s founder Brian Ramsay is a veteran of the waste management business, having spent 20 years in charge of Biffa’s operations in Scotland. He started Recycling Solutions in 2000 following a suggestion from former client John Cadzow, who owned a landfill site used by Biffa. The company started by targeting small and medium sized clients, with a willingness to handle small jobs. The range of services extends from skip and ro-ro hire, to confidential shredding, to collecting trade, plastic, paper, glass and cardboard waste for recycling at its own specialised facility. The company has extended its service range by means of partnerships covering confidential data storage (with DataSafe) and office cleaning supplies (with Daisy Direct).
Because it is willing to discuss each client’s recycling needs in detail (encouraging them to recycle as much waste as possible), and to provide a reliable, frequent service, Recycling Solutions has won business with larger organizations. It has the waste contract for St John’s Hospital in Livingston, and through that covers all the specialist recycling needs of the West Lothian health board. It has served Napier University for three years, and more recently has taken on the Marks & Spencer stores in Edinburgh’s Princes Street and the Gyle, with the prospect of rolling out this contract to other M&S stores.
According to Brian Ramsay, the larger waste management companies own landfill sites and are not particularly interested in offering recycling services, especially small jobs with SME customers, and nor are they well structured in management terms to address this sector. This gives Recycling Solutions a major opportunity to win market share, and it is this growth potential which was one of the key factors that attracted Sigma. In addition, Sigma sees a significant opportunity to develop the company by partnering with some of the many companies currently developing innovative recycling technologies.
The fact that Recycling Solutions has the appropriate regulatory status and a ready supply of waste material means that it is potentially an ideal partner for early stage companies that are looking to take recycling technologies out of the lab and into a full-scale commercial environment.
Recycling Solutions has been self-financing in its first three years of operation. The new funding will enable it to expand its geographical coverage and acquire new equipment that will help extend the range of services and enhance the margins on existing lines of business.